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Carson Valley Museum & Cultural Center introduces ‘Lake Tahoe Room’

Kurt Hildebrand
khildebrand@recordcourier.com
Standing in the Glenbrook Inn diorama Dennis Little president of the Douglas County Historical Society talks about the new "Lake Tahoe Room" at the museum.
Jim Grant | The Record-Courier

In a giant game of display pinball, the Carson Valley Museum & Cultural Center used the room for a new Lake Tahoe exhibit.

Clearing out one of the museum’s original exhibits, the Red Swift taxidermy collection, made room for the changes.

The collection was in disrepair and required a substantial amount of work to restore, according to Douglas County Historical Society President Dennis Little.



“We had a taxidermist look at the exhibit and he gave us a staggering estimate to preserve them,” he said.

Some portions of the collection remain in the museum, including the large stuffed tiger in honor of the Douglas High School mascot, the big horn sheep and an owl.



Meanwhile, the space has been taken over for the Lake Tahoe Room, which features a recreation of the Glenbrook Inn and will house the Van Sickle Research Library.

Little said the family, who operated Van Sickle Station before Nevada became a state is part of both Carson Valley and Lake Tahoe history, providing the name for Van Sickle Bi-state Park at Stateline.

The room also provided an indoor spot for the sleigh believed to once be owned by pioneer stagecoach driver Hank Monk and a display devoted to Snowshoe Thompson. The sleigh was outside greeting visitors to the museum for many years.

Little said the sleigh’s exposure to the weather was a factor in getting it moved into the museum.

The museum’s Tahoe exhibit had been on the bottom floor with Main Street Gardnerville for many years, so moving it to higher altitude corrected a longtime geographical anomaly.

“We didn’t have too many people call us on it,” Little said.

In its place, the museum moved the Jane’s Beauty Shop exhibit, which for years graced the east wing, but is now located on Main Street, along with the exhibits for the Corner Bar and The Record-Courier.

The east wing will provide room for an exhibit featuring the Women’s Remembering Project.

A portion of the museum’s Hans Meyer-Kassel collection will be at the Nevada Museum of Art now through Sept. 2.

Meyer-Kassel lived in Genoa until his death in 1952 and painted scenes and portraits in Nevada’s oldest town.


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